I travel a lot. And to be honest: it usually is horrific to find what I am looking for. No matter if I use Google or go directly to a travel site, it always takes me way too long to find the hotel or flight which fits me best. Both travel sites and Google I think could do a much better job for those seeking travel information.

In the past few years travelsites and Google have developed a love – hate relationship. Travel sites depended on Google for much of their traffic, but at the same time saw Google take away that traffic when Google decided to launch some features which would bypass the travel sites. On the other side Google is very much interested in the reviews which appear wealthily on travel sites.

One thing I’m personally always missing on travel sites is the right imagery and the right videos. And with that I don’t mean the standard images of an hotel room or holiday house which never actually show what a place really look like. I always wanted to see imagery from people who were actually there. Now research from search marketing agency, Epiphany with use of Searchmetrics also shows that the imagery which is being used could be used a lot better for findability in Google. (more…)